Monday 10 October 2016

I'm back!

Update: August 2016
It's been a long time since I've added anything to my Boler Blog.  We had a great holiday in PEI in 2015, but this year we only managed to get away for couple of weekends at provincial parks closer to home.  In this picture, we revisited Sturgeon Bay Provincial Park, on Georgian Bay.  It's where we went on our restored Boler's inaugural trip three summers ago.
  Joining us on our trip this summer were our son Carl and his girlfriend.  For a few years now, all four of our children have expressed a desire to have their own Bolers, and Carl has seemed the most enthusiastic about the idea.
And this is where I begin the next phase of my fiberglass trailer adventure.  A few weeks ago (mid-September, 2016) I spotted a Trillium trailer with a hand-made For Sale sign taped to the front window shade.  I couldn't resist!  The seller said that it had suffered some damage.  Here is what it looked like on that day:





The damage consisted primarily of large cracks in the fiberglass body, along the roof on the driver's side.  It was pretty bad, probably caused by a large tree limb falling on it, but I thought it was within my abilities to repair it.  I hadn't done any fiberglass work on my '72 Boler, and had only limited experience working with fiberglass when I repaired a hole in one of my canoes.  The seller and I settled on a fair price, and then I drove home to prepare my Subaru Forester for towing the trailer away.  I was apprehensive about telling Gail that I had just spent money on a second trailer, so I did what any sensible husband would do in similar circumstances -- I said nothing more than "I have to return to town to get something important at the store."
My son Carl helped me haul it home, and during the drive we decided that restoring it would be an excellent father-son project. He recently graduated from university and is a fully-employed chemical engineer.  He owns a new Subaru Crosstrek -- a suitable small car for pulling a lightweight fiberglass trailer.  Last week he completed the vehicle registration papers, and so the trailer is officially his.  As for Gail's reaction, it turned out that she was thrilled.  In her excitement that evening she pulled Carl over to her computer to take him on a cross-Canada tour of Trillium and Boler ads on Kijiji in order to show him just how rare and coveted they are.  (More people post "trailer wanted" ads than post "for sale" ads.)

Carl has begun a blog called "Carl's TrilliumTrailer Resuscitation" to document the work on this Trillium.  I have decided to include our work in my ongoing Boler blog -- not to simply duplicate the content of his blog, but to see if my perspective on the work proves to be any different than his. Here is his web address:  http://carlstrillium.blogspot.ca/   You should definitely follow both!

See you at my next posting,
Louis

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